ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS

Lecture 1: Introduction to Environmental Economics
Lecture 2: Environmental Regulations and Compliance
Lecture 3: Carbon Pricing Mechanisms
Lecture 4: Carbon Markets: Emissions Trading Systems (ETS)
Lecture 5: Corporate Sustainability and ESG Reporting
Lecture 6: Green Business Opportunities
Lecture 7: Decarbonization Development Path
Lecture 8: Climate Finance and Investment
Lecture 9: International Trends and Global Agreements
Lecture 10: Final Project Presentation

Assessment:
• Class Engagement: 10%
• Mid-term Project presentation: 55%
• Final examination (written and closed book exam): 35%
Final Project Assessment Rubric
Total Weight: 55% of the course grade
Components: Presentation: 20% and Report: 35%
1. Presentation (20%)
2. Report (35%)

Reading materials:

• Textbook:
  • Field B. and M. Field (2016) Environmental Economics, 7th Edition, McGraw-Hill, USA.
  • Bryant, Gareth; Webber, Sophie (2024) : Climate Finance: Taking a Position on Climate Futures, ISBN 9781788214629, Agenda Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne, https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12657/88193 ,https://www.agendapub.com/page/detail/climate-finance/?k=978178821462
• Papers and others: see in the lecture plan.

Lecture 1: 

Readings:

• Eidelwein, F., Collatto, D. C., Rodrigues, L. H., Lacerda, D. P., & Piran, F. S. (2018). Internalization of environmental externalities: Development of a method for elaborating the statement of economic and environmental results. Journal of Cleaner Production, 170, 1316-1327.
• Libecap, Gary D. 2014. “Addressing Global Environmental Externalities: Transaction Costs Considerations.” Journal of Economic Literature, 52 (2): 424–79.
• Wu, R. (2023). Environmental management, environmental innovation, and productivity growth: a global firm-level investigation. Environment and Development Economics, 28(5), 449-468.

Lecture 2:

Readings:

• Blackman, A., Li, Z., & Liu, A. A. (2018). Efficacy of command-and-control and market-based environmental regulation in developing countries. Annual Review of Resource Economics, 10(1), 381-404.
• Zhong, J., & Pei, J. (2024). Carbon border adjustment mechanism: a systematic literature review of the latest developments. Climate Policy, 24(2), 228-242.
• Clausing, K. A., & Wolfram, C. (2023). Carbon border adjustments, climate clubs, and subsidy races when climate policies vary. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 37(3), 137-162.
• Shen, H., Yang, Q., Luo, L., & Huang, N. (2023). Market reactions to a cross-border carbon policy: Evidence from listed Chinese companies. The British Accounting Review, 55(1), 101116.

Lecture 3:

Readings:

• The World Bank (2024) “State and Trends of Carbon Pricing: International Carbon Markets,” Washington, DC.
• Manta, A. G., Doran, N. M., Bădîrcea, R. M., Badareu, G., & Țăran, A. M. (2023). Does the implementation of a Pigouvian tax be considered an effective approach to address climate change mitigation?. Economic Analysis and Policy, 80, 1719-1731.
• Metcalf, G. E. (2021). Carbon taxes in theory and practice. Annual Review of Resource Economics, 13(1), 245-265.
• Xu, H., Pan, X., Li, J., Feng, S., & Guo, S. (2023). Comparing the impacts of carbon tax and carbon emission trading, which regulation is more effective?. Journal of Environmental Management, 330, 117156.
• Do, T. N., & Burke, P. J. (2021). Carbon pricing in Vietnam: Options for adoption. Energy and Climate Change, 2, 100058.

Lecture 4: 

Readings:

• Nong, D., Nguyen, T. H., Wang, C., & Van Khuc, Q. (2020). The environmental and economic impact of the emissions trading scheme (ETS) in Vietnam. Energy Policy, 140, 111362.
• Ren, S., Yang, X., Hu, Y., & Chevallier, J. (2022). Emission trading, induced innovation and firm performance. Energy economics, 112, 106157.

Lecture 5:

Readings:

• Crifo, P., & Forget, V. D. (2015). The economics of corporate social responsibility: A firm‐level perspective survey. Journal of Economic Surveys, 29(1), 112-130.
• Siew, R. Y. (2015). A review of corporate sustainability reporting tools (SRTs). Journal of environmental management, 164, 180-195.
• Deng, X., Li, W., & Ren, X. (2023). More sustainable, more productive: Evidence from ESG ratings and total factor productivity among listed Chinese firms. Finance Research Letters, 51, 103439.

Lecture 6:

Readings:

• Su, B., Heshmati, A., Geng, Y., & Yu, X. (2013). A review of the circular economy in China: moving from rhetoric to implementation. Journal of cleaner production, 42, 215-227.
• Vinante, C., Sacco, P., Orzes, G., & Borgianni, Y. (2021). Circular economy metrics: Literature review and company-level classification framework. Journal of Cleaner Production, 288, 125090.
• Horbach, J., & Rammer, C. (2020). Circular economy innovations, growth and employment at the firm level: Empirical evidence from Germany. Journal of industrial ecology, 24(3), 615-625.

Lecture 7:

Readings:

• Liu, B., Cifuentes-Faura, J., Ding, C. J., & Liu, X. (2023). Toward carbon neutrality: how will environmental regulatory policies affect corporate green innovation?. Economic Analysis and Policy, 80, 1006-1020.
• World Bank. (2022). Vietnam country climate and development report.
• Ghosh, N. and Gupta, D. (2023), “Decarbonization strategy of businesses, stock return performance and investment styles: a systematic review”, Benchmarking: An International Journal, Vol. 30 No. 7, pp. 2432-2457.

Liu, P., & Qiao, H. (2021). How does China’s decarbonization policy influence the value of carbon-intensive firms?. Finance Research Letters, 43, 102141.

Lecture 8:

Readings:

• Monasterolo, I. (2020). Climate change and the financial system. Annual Review of Resource Economics, 12(1), 299-320.
• Rishikesh Ram Bhandary, Kelly Sims Gallagher & Fang Zhang (2021) Climate finance policy in practice: a review of the evidence, Climate Policy, 21:4, 529-545, DOI: 10.1080/14693062.2020.1871313
• Reboredo, J. C., & Ugolini, A. (2020). Price connectedness between green bond and financial markets. Economic Modelling, 88, 25-38.
• Lamperti, F., Bosetti, V., Roventini, A., Tavoni, M., & Treibich, T. (2021). Three green financial policies to address climate risks. Journal of Financial Stability, 54, 100875.

Lecture 9:

Readings:

• Bellelli, F. S., Scarpa, R., & Aftab, A. (2023). An empirical analysis of participation in international environmental agreements. Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 118, 102783.
• OECD (2008) GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL CO-OPERATION. OECD ENVIRONMENTAL OUTLOOK TO 2030.
• Montiel, I., Cuervo-Cazurra, A., Park, J., Antolín-López, R., & Husted, B. W. (2021). Implementing the United Nations’ sustainable development goals in international business. Journal of International Business Studies, 52(5), 999.
• https://www.informea.org/en